Enlarge / Rewind reportedly lets you search your Mac’s utilization historical past for what you’ve seen, stated, or heard.
Rewind AI
Yesterday, an organization referred to as Rewind AI introduced a self-titled software program product for Macs with Apple Silicon that reportedly retains a extremely compressed, searchable record of everything you do domestically in your Mac and lets you “rewind” time to see it later. If you neglect one thing you’ve “seen, said, or heard,” Rewind wants to assist you discover it simply.
Rewind AI claims its product shops all recording information domestically in your machine and doesn’t require cloud integration. Among its guarantees, Rewind will reportedly let you rewind Zoom conferences and pull info from them in a searchable kind.
In a video demo on Rewind.AI’s website, the app opens when a person presses Command+Shift+Space. The search bar suggests typing “anything you’ve seen, said, or heard.” It additionally reveals a timeline on the backside of the display screen that represents earlier actions in apps.
A promotional video from Rewind AI.
After trying to find “tps reports,” the video depicts a grid view of each time Rewind has encountered the phrase “tps reports” as audio or textual content in any app, together with Zoom chats, textual content messages, emails, Slack conversations, and Word paperwork. It describes filtering the outcomes by app—and the power to copy and paste from these previous situations if vital.
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Founded by Dan Siroker and Brett Bejcek, Rewind AI consists of a small distant workforce positioned in varied cities across the US. Portions of the corporate beforehand created Scribe, a precursor to Rewind that acquired some press consideration in 2021. In an introductory weblog publish, Rewind AI co-founder Dan Siroker writes, “What if we could use technology to augment our memory the same way a hearing aid can augment our hearing?”
How does it work?
Rewind AI offers few particulars concerning the app’s back-end expertise however describes “mind-boggling compression” that can reportedly compress recording information up to 3,750 instances “without a major loss of quality,” giving an instance of 10.5GB of knowledge squeezed down to simply 2.8MB. Rewind says that even on a small laborious drive, “you can store years of recordings”—a heady declare, to be certain.
Enlarge / Image of a Mac working Rewind.
Rewind AI
The Rewind website additionally describes utilizing OCR to seize textual content content material and automatic speech recognition to mechanically transcribe something you’ve stated or heard, together with in conferences, in order that “you never have to worry about losing this content again.”
(If Rewind converts everything it sees and hears into plain textual content, that may clarify the huge compression ratio. The demo didn’t present any dwell video or audio recording playback, for instance, simply static screenshots with highlighted textual content. We have requested Rewind AI to make clear this level and can replace the article if we obtain a response.)
Rewind AI additionally says that Apple Silicon Macs with M1 and M2 chips are key to making the product work in a “virtually imperceptible” means, using “virtually every part of the System on a Chip.”
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Potential privateness points
While laying out the imaginative and prescient for Rewind AI within the weblog publish talked about above, Siroker writes, “Our vision is to give humans perfect memory.” But commenters on Twitter and YouTube have already begun stating situations the place “perfect memory” may backfire.
For instance, Rewind would possibly expose its customers to potential abuse from overbearing companions, bosses, legislation enforcement, or repressive governments; authorized points from recording delicate info; and consent points round recording different individuals in conferences.
Rewind addresses a few of these considerations on its website, saying, “We store all of the recordings locally on your Mac. Only you have access to them.” Their demo website additionally says that you’ll have the opportunity to pause or delete recordings at any time, and you can mechanically exclude sure apps out of your recorded historical past, together with non-public searching modes in browsers.
Enlarge / A screenshot of details about privateness from Rewind’s web site.
Rewind AI
As far as acquiring permission to record a gathering with different members, Rewind offers its personal assist web page titled “Everything you need to know about consent” that features recommendation similar to “Before you record someone, you should always ask for their consent.” The web page recommends telling individuals the assembly will probably be recorded—maybe forward of time—and that customers observe all native legal guidelines associated to recording conversations.
Privacy and moral considerations apart, Andreessen Horowitz is taking the expertise significantly sufficient to lead a $10 million spherical of funding at a valuation of $75 million. The enterprise capital agency wrote about its causes for investing in Rewind, posing the product as a treatment for info overload.
Currently, the Rewind product shouldn’t be publicly out there, however anybody can request “Early Access” on the Rewind web site. We reached out to Rewind and requested for an opportunity to strive the software program.
